Published: June 21, 2009 01:06 am      

IN THE FAST LANE: Pre-vacation NASCAR thoughts

Well, it’s time for old Kev to take a little break from the trials and tribulations associated with community journalism.

For an entire week, I plan on enjoying some country living in my native east central Indiana.

I’ll see how tall the newly-grown corn is getting. I’ll rediscover how horrendous my golf game is. I even plan on visiting an area racetrack and watch what I like to call “real-life reality TV.”

But before I leave the hectic environment of the Clark-Floyd area, let me express a couple of my thoughts about my beloved NASCAR.

• Road courses — either NASCAR drivers, crew chiefs and fans love them or hate them.

So which side of this so-called political NASCAR issue do I take?

I love them.

It’s always neat to see a different style of racing in the Sprint Cup Series once in a while. Not only do you see drivers turn the steering wheel left and right, it’s a challenge for crew chiefs to determine pit strategy and get the car handling well in at least 10 different corners.

The Cup series runs two challenging road courses per season — one in today’s race at Infineon Raceway in Sonoma, Calif., and the second on Aug. 9 at Watkins Glen (N.Y.) International.

In fact, both of these tracks are so challenging that I think at least one of them should be put into the Chase for the Sprint Cup schedule.

Ever since the advent of the Chase, I’ve always thought the playoff system’s slate should include its most challenging racetracks. And they don’t get more challenging than both of these road courses.

• Last Tuesday after a Goodyear tire test at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, Jeff Gordon “guaranteed” that there will not be a repeat of last year’s frustrating tire debacle for the Allstate 400 at the Brickyard.

“I’m 100 percent confident. I ran this tire as hard as I possibly could, put numerous laps on them. It’s a dead issue,” Gordon said in a NASCAR.com story.

With all due respect to the four-time Brickyard winner, I’ll believe it when I see it.

I have to be skeptical because I was one of the thousands of fans who was at last year’s Brickyard and remember how ridiculous that race was.

I cannot forget the exploding tires and the competitive caution periods every 10 laps that produced no rhythm during the race. And when there was green-flag racing, most of the drivers did not race at full throttle because they were afraid another tire would disintegrate.

To put it mildly, it was by far the worst race I had seen in my 24 years attending races at IMS.

According to Gordon, I should get money’s worth this year.

I hope you’re right, Jeff.



TODAY’S TOYOTA/SAVE MART 350

at Infineon Raceway, Sonoma, Calif.

TOP FIVE CONTENDERS

1. JEFF GORDON: The undisputed road-course king is required to be in the contenders’ list, especially when he has nine career road-course victories. The majority of those wins has been at Sonoma with five. Plus he hasn’t won at Infineon since 2006, so he’s due.

2. TONY STEWART: “Smoke” is the No. 1 contender to knock Gordon off the road-course throne. He has six career road-course wins, two coming at Sonoma. Don’t expect Stewart to cool off this week.

3. JUAN PABLO MONTOYA: Don’t look now, but the former open-wheel ace has been on a roll as of late and is a contender to make the Chase. He has four top-10s in the last six races. That streak should continue today at his best track, where he collected his lone Cup victory two years ago.

4. KYLE BUSCH: The scariest thing I discovered about Busch last year was his prowess on road courses, convincing me that this guy is fast no matter what track he competes at. He won both road-course races last year, which prompted crazy rumors of a possible Formula 1 ride for him in the future.

5. ROBBY GORDON: It’s rare for me to make the driver I call “Reckless Robby” a contender at any race. But he knows his way around a road course with two wins and 10 top-10s in his career.



TODAY’S DARK HORSE

• MARCOS AMBROSE: The Australian was running in the top five with about 25 laps to go in last year’s Sonoma race before suffering a broken transmission. He’s not the dark horse just because he’s a road-course ace. Ambrose is a surprising 20th in the current point standings and has six top-15 finishes this season, which is better than I expected. If he gets some good track position late in today’s race, look for him to be a contender for the win.



WHO MIGHT STRUGGLE?

• JEFF GORDON: You must being asking yourself — are you a moron or something? Why are you saying today’s top contender might struggle, especially after just crowning him the road-course king? For one simple and painful reason — his aching back. The four-time series champion’s back has been a royal thorn in his side for a year and a half. And when you have to turn left and right on a consistent basis like today, your back is going to feel mighty uncomfortable and it’s going to wear you out by the end of the day. Gordon’s stamina and pain threshold will be tested today.

Contact Kevin Harris at kevin.harris@newsandtribune.com.